scott x hope oneshots

such a rollercoaster

this one is extremely long but well worth the read :)

It starts because Darren asks her if she's got a date to the staff Christmas party. Which she doesn't, but she feels very, very compelled to lie.

He corners her when he's on his way out of Hank's office and she's on her way in, and the not-truth automatically materializes on her tongue before she can think about it. His mouth twists unpleasantly on one side. "The Mexican guy? Luis?" he asks disbelievingly. He doesn't pronounce the name right. "No way he's good enough for you. Really, Hope."

"No," she half-snaps back. It comes out more defensive than she means it to. Because yes, the plan was to get Luis to go with her. He comes to half the Pym Tech events, anyway – he's a good friend to have on one side of her around all her father's colleagues. They like to sit in a far-off corner and make up whispered stories about the party guests. He's better at it than she is. Luis is possibly the most creative person she knows, though his talents when it comes to whispering could use a little work. "Not Luis. We're just friends. No, it's someone else I'm, um, seeing." Her voice comes out higher-pitched than normal, but she thinks she's convincing enough, besides that. It gets Darren to back off, at least. She feels inordinately proud of herself for about thirty seconds until he disappears into the elevator, and then she realizes the trap she's effectively pushed herself into.

Okay, so the whole thing is a damn mess, and now Hope van Dyne is stuck.

The good news is that anyone from school is fair game, because Darren goes to a fancy private school across the city, and he doesn't know any of them. She's going to ask Tony Stark. That's the original plan, at least. She decides this when she sees him down the hallway the next morning. There are several reasons why this plan is a good one, and she lists them all out in her head while she absentmindedly pulls her math textbook from her locker. Like the fact that they're friends, sort of, even if they've grown apart since their respective fathers' falling-out. Like the fact that he's a senior and Darren is only a junior, like her. Like the fact that he would probably say yes, really, because it would piss off his dad. And, perhaps most importantly, the fact that it would piss off her dad, too. Really, convincing Tony to go to the Christmas party with her checks all the boxes, only by the time Hope has shut her locker and squared her shoulders and taken one step in his direction, she's already remembered the very specific reason she can't follow through on that. Pepper Potts. They've been hovering in that strange almost-dating-but-not-quite territory since last spring break, or maybe even longer, and she isn't about to throw a wrench into the middle of that.

No, it will have to be someone else.

"I'm in a situation," she complains at lunch. She doesn't feel like eating. She has under a week to find a date to the stupid Christmas party, and the entire thing makes her feel sort of sick. Blurting out the details to Ava, Carol and Luis doesn't do much to ease that, and Hope pushes her food off to the side so she can lean forward and rest her forehead on the table. To her friends' credits, they begin to scan the cafeteria and suggest other options, though the names come seemingly at random and she emphatically turns down all of them. "This is ridiculous," she mumbles into the tabletop. "I'm just going to have to tell him the truth."

"Or," Luis interjects, sounding far too excited. Hope closes her eyes. She can recognize his I-have-an-idea tone anywhere, and while said ideas always have some sort of brilliance to them, it's often buried deep, and usually hidden by several run-on sentences strung together. "Or, listen, you could just tell him the guy bailed on you or you broke up or something and you're just, like, absolutely heartbroken and never want to look at another guy again, and –"

"Hope, heartbroken? Unlikely."

Great. The rest of Luis' friends have arrived, squeezing in around the table. There isn't really enough room for seven, but they manage by sacrificing trivial, unimportant things. Like Hope's elbow space. Good thing she feels too sick to move, let alone sit up properly and try to eat without moving her arms at all.